E-mail, Feeds, 'n' Stuff

Friday, May 2, 2008

Sign o' the times

The dead-tree version of the Portland Tribune is scaling down to once a week, on Thursdays. Meanwhile, they're promising more frequent action on their website. (How can they afford what they're spending on bloggers?)

Ink on paper continues to suffer, and a failing economy isn't going to help. One can only hope that while the print editions gradually disappear, professional journalism will persevere on the web. All the more reason to click on those ads on your screen once in a while, I guess.

The New York Times and other newspapers are continuing their sharp decline. Editor & Publisher reports that Sunday circulation for The New York Times fell a whopping 9.2%, while its daily rate fell by nearly 4% for the six-month period ending March 31, 2008. The story's much the same for other major liberal papers: the LA Times daily circulation dropped 5.1%, while Sunday declined 6.0%.

Who needs the Trib when all they do is repeat the same status quo establishment sustainable mantras while also failing to pierce to the core of the many obscured local issues. Just like the Oregonian.

IMO Steve Clark is a pandering clone who's bought into every gov BS peddled around here.
The ultimate example was his stupid claim that the upcoming Genentec "packaging plant" was a silencer for us biotech critics.

The Trib barely and rarely touches any more than the O does on majopr issues like SoWa always stopping far short of telling the bigger story with all the pieces in place.

Someone I know in Pendleton who majored in journalism sheds some light on why newspapers may be becoming increasingly irrelevant. She says that the market for newspaper jobs is so very competitive that applicants have to pump themselves up, and that reporters and editors become arrogant believing the pumped up version of themselves is who they really are and that they really are better than other people and have a right to make all sorts of outrageously biased presumptions and pronouncements.

My friend Roger Troen died April 23. Not only has the O not printed an obituary,but it didn't even print a death notice so that people who knew him could attend his memorial service. I am guessing this is because they know him primarily as someone who received stolen animals after an ALF raid in 1986 and don't want anyone thinking of him as any kind of hero. So they dismiss his humanity and the right to a death notice. Actually he had many personas: fifth grade teacher, print shop assistant,proofreader in the Air Force. The O is so presumptuous about the ALF stuff that it takes it out of context and misses animal stories that are important to the public, like veterinarians who have been forced to use animals with microchips as research subjects in school and are threatened with flunking exams if they try to expose it.

No one should be happy about the struggles of newspapers, least of all bloggers (and blog commenters). Without mainstream papers collecting and reporting news -- and giving it to you FOR FREE on their websites in most cases -- many bloggers would have nothing to write about.

Jack is a good writer, an insightful observer, and does some good investigative reporting of his own. But nonetheless, how many of his posts are inspired by or kicked off with news reported in the Tribune, Willamette Week, and yes, even the god-awful OregonLive site?

Mainstream papers are, like any other human organization, prone to bias and do not always live up to their professed standard of objectivity. But I'd much rather have papers striving to write balanced stories and occasionally failing than go back to the days where every newspaper was a partisan shill. If I want my slant on things validated, I can go read National Review or The Nation.

And any of you that dislike our current newspaper options in Portland are free to start your own paper (online or print). I think once you realize how hard it is to write timely, balanced, compelling copy to deadline day in and day out you'll be less quick to kick the newspapers while they're down.

I like this. All newspapers are "liberal" therefore when circulation drops it is because of their "liberal" bias. Then you have a newspaper like the conservative Washington Times who has a circulation of about 1/7th of the rival Post. I guess that means "liberals" outnumber conservatives in this country by about 7 to 1.

Greg C

Oh I forgot there is the Wall Street Journal that everyone reads for their conservative opinion page. "Really there is business news in the WSJ? Well I never knew."

True enough Eric. Life is very hard these days. But anyone should be able to listen and think without letting ego get in the way and blind them. Interacting with what is out there and letting it help you grow is the stuff of life.

I had hopes (still do) that the Tribune would realize that the local press is inundated with the liberal/progressive bent on about every issue and would seek a middle course. Also, I had hoped that they would do more investigative reporting. The Sustainable supplement is a disappointment in that it doesn't recognize the hype and misleading aspects of so much of the issue. It is not that we shouldn't be green, but we need to be critical, investigative and expose the money greening aspects.

To the two Erics: Excellent points well taken. And what would the electronic media--radio and television--do without newspaper reporting. When I was in the radio news biz, we ripped-and-read stuff the AP and UPI picked up from newspapers and put on the broadcast wire; and, now, if the electronic media does any "news" at all, it comes from the same source.

I may owe the O an apology; I learned that someone who took responsibility for getting Troen obituaries out, didn't want one in the paper. Possibly to keep buyers away from his property a block from the N Interstate rail line that someone is lying to his partner about, saying it is worth 40K (land only) when someone recently offered Troen 200K. Another land scam in the making. ho hum.

As well over 75% of so-called "journalists" are registered Democrats, the liberal bias in mainstram media is fairly well documented.

By the way, The Wall Street Journal was among a very few print media that showed an uptick in subscriber rates during the same period, according to E&P. This tells me that people actually do respond favorably to balanced reportage.

Road Work

Miles run year to date: 113
At this date last year: 155
Total run in 2016: 155
In 2015: 271
In 2014: 401
In 2013: 257
In 2012: 129
In 2011: 113
In 2010: 125
In 2009: 67
In 2008: 28
In 2007: 113
In 2006: 100
In 2005: 149
In 2004: 204
In 2003: 269